The Garden
by missMich
Summary: COMPLETE Hermione, alone in the dark, has gone mad. Soon she finds company... HG-SS and very dark some spoilers, adult themes, warnings in Author's Notes. Reviews? Flames? Anyone out there?
1. Default Chapter

The Garden Falling into insanity, with company. SS/HG and quite dark. Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns these people along with various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.  
  
Author's note: Just a few days in a dungeon losing her mind... or maybe gaining something else. SS/HG, some *spoilers* and such. First fanfic posting, be gentle with me. This story is kind of a monster leaping from my mind freely while I try to keep up, doing my best to make it presentable.  
  
WARNING- references to rape and torture. Oh, a little fluff crept in too, sorry folks.  
  
Prologue  
  
If I can just drift far enough, I can forget this terror. The pain, the humiliation, their anger over my silence... Oh please release me from this nightmare! I want to walk in my garden... It's green there, and so fragrant. Everywhere I turn is colour, explosions of the most beautiful flowers and brilliant greens. The carpet of ferns and grasses is so cool on my bare feet, and the sun beats down on my face. I approach a new tree, oddly low and dark. The sounds of birds and the rush of water are fading, and the crushing silence threatens....  
  
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	2. Three Days in the Dark

Three days in dark 

The dark is stealing my senses, my mind. It wraps me completely in the most intimate embrace, pressed close to my skin and filling my eyes. The silence hangs in the air like a suffocating lover, crushing me beneath him in terrible ecstasy. This play of total oblivion seems almost... what, comforting, now. Final. Then why is it not peaceful, instead it rages on me, adding scar upon scar to my battered soul. 

But my silence is not total, it has relented somehow, why why why, think it means something if I could just remember what it means. Its just here somewhere, I know its important very important that the quiet is interrupted...

_THEY ARE COMING!_ the thought sends my mind reeling again.

Caught between the awful pit of silent darkness and the terror of the Dark ones, I'm screaming again.

Maybe if I'm still, yes, quiet and very still.

They aren't coming, They are leaving. Are you real? You seem so like him, but crushed down and draped in filth. The cloak, so like his was. At school, black and full. But yours is torn and stained with russet (is that blood, oh please no). I can't reach you, the pain of moving. My chains reach their end, the sound not even stirring you. Are you dead, have They hung you there as a signal, that I'm next? The traitor for the Light, perfect spy, were you loyal to us? Is this the proof? Please, wake and tell me. 

The mark, this tree bears the Dark Mark! Why is it here in my garden? 

No, fight this! _Stay in the dungeon, wake him,_ _find your voice and WAKE HIM._ Ah, that is gone too, remember. I thought of everything. So I couldn't betray, no matter what They did. _And They did try girl, didn't They? Your silence kept you alive, while They sought to break it. Break YOU. _They...yes They need to hear the screams, my screams. I managed a much better prison for myself than They have provided me, didn't I? I removed my voice, and now They have provided darkness and silence for me as well, all blackness and shadow, all colour wiped from the world in my cosy little cell. 

But there is light in here somewhere, the sound of rushing water, music of nature... just slip back into that, its here, I just had it...

NO, stay here, find out, tree or man, are you a memory, a figment of my fevered brain, or wonder of horrors, _are you real?_

I need to know, _is it him_? The dark hair, but in this shadow, all is dark. I can't see your face. Turn your face to me. Insult me, cajole me, tell me its weak and foolish to slip back into the garden. 

Please let me know, are you REAL??

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Another day, the light comes. _Light, no just lack of inky oblivion. _Is it the moon? Where is the window? No, They love the night; play in the night, this light is day, somehow from somewhere, real or bewitched.

They are bringing you in, hanging from my wall, such a puzzling tree...

No, not tree, man. Arms chained to a heavy bar setting on your back... and hung from this dungeon wall. That's where I am, in the cold, on the wet stone floor, filthy and starving, _but They come for him now, not me. giggling hysterically_ waiting for the break in blackness that I know think must somehow be the sun, the faint glow just enough to see you there, almost make out who you are, if you are, see if you will wake, talk to me, tell me which is dream here or there? Maybe I sleep in the grass, and this is only nightmare. 

Think think think, so many hours to try before the dark comes and They take you away again. If I could only reach you, somehow touch your arm so tantalizingly close. Damn these chains, I can't stretch, the pain is so great. Just a few inches more, and I can wake you. 

Not dead, you are asleep. I can hear you breathe. I match it with my own. Why put you so close if you won't talk to me, tell me if this is real, or the garden? The light is fading, footfalls on the stone. I feel the march of your demons, vibrating through the floor to me. Retreat, fade back, sleep...sleep...if I could only sleep. 

Where do you go? What do They do to _you_? Are you mad too?

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I can nearly reach you now, if only your cloak were thicker, a fold of it is just near my hand here. I've tried to claw at the chains, but the stone is hard and my hands, They've done something to my hands... boiled them clean? 

No, I will not think about it. I know you are real, and I am awake now, in this nightmare. I cannot speak, and it's my own fault. I am so far gone, I actually want the madness now. I've hidden there so often these past days, I don't know how much longer I can safely stay there and still fight my way back out. 

Always a cell in the dark, but now there is just you in the pale and meagre light that comes every morning. They don't come for me anymore, the demons in black hoods, Death Eaters They are. I wish They had brought me death, I fear They will bring me something worse soon. 

I know how I got here, a letter for the Order, a demon in the darkness, pain and fear and horrible plans and finally here, with you. 

How did you get here? Is this a test? If I wake you will They end this? I will stay here when They take you next, They can wake you I'm sure. These new ones, They ignore me as you do. Make me think I'm not here. I know I am, you would know, too, if I could just reach you...

Professor, please, answer me! You can hear my thoughts I know it, if I can scream them loud enough. 

No? Ok, then if not loud, how about insistent. Simple, relentless, sane would help. 'LOOK, I cannot speak,' over and over I try,'LOOK, I cannot speak, LOOK, I cannot speak, LOOK, I cannot speak,' please look at me.

They are here, IT IS YOU! That voice, your face! 

"Traitorous snake, its time again. Didn't you miss us?" They taunt you. Why do you look at them, but never me?

"Is it morning already? I'm sure I haven't missed you at all, every evil thought has hit you squarely..." Your voice is gone now, you looked this way and didn't see. Maybe I'm not really here then, maybe if I just wake up. Birds, I can hear birds, and smell the sweet grass...

Tell me cruel black tree, faded memory from schooldays and this never-ending war... do you know the answers...can you tell me tell me...

Am _I_ real??

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	3. An Open Mind

An open mind... 

You sleep as you hang beneath the bar you support. You appear to be asleep nearly every moment we share in the dungeon. I think now that you merely appear so... Do you know that I'm here? Or am I only a tortured spirit now? 

You now are draped in something new; a heavy brown blanket has replaced the worn black cloak. Why a blanket, why provide you with warmth? I have to know, if I just stretch a bit further...

I barely brush the edge of it with the very tip of my fingers, enough to feel it is rough and a bit sharp, some sort of matted hair. It's very unpleasant on my fingers even now that I've let go, and yet it is covering your entire body, the bar across your shoulders digging it into you. The brief touch gets your attention and as you slowly turn to look at me for the first time my heart leaps into my mouth, because for the briefest moment you look both serene and intensely haunted. And then it's gone, the look is wiped from your eyes and replaced with your usual stony glare. 

"You?" is your astonished rasp, but the questioning in your voice is not reflected at all in your eyes. No, the look that is dawning is NOT confusion at all. It's resolute and slightly murderous. 

My heart leaps as I realize that I am real, and I DO know you, not just a memory, not an illusion, and that you weren't aware of my presence, and I'm no longer alone! I cannot answer out loud, but send a nod and my best closed expression. I try not to show the pain and fear. Not your student anymore, many years from the giggling girl you knew...(_And the giggling walks in the garden, ah those are in hiding, for sharing later perhaps.)_

"But how? How long have you been here?" Your voice is losing the harshness of misuse now.

I do my best to think my answer, over and over like the prayer of a child the single simple phrase, 'I cannot speak'. My gestures and look are imploring you to hear my thoughts, and understand my plight, the mistake of my own cleverness. Maybe I am that insufferable schoolgirl still... 

The chain gives me just enough slack to point to my throat and shake my head. Even this exhausts me as I hang my head briefly to hide the pain in my face from you. And I hear your reply in my thoughts, 'then show me here.' I recoil from the look of your eyes as you take in my appearance finally. I know I am cold and wet, dirty and beaten and miserable, but I haven't seen my own face in so long now, and there it is reflected in your eyes. I can't bear to look.

"You must look, its easier for me," you implore. This time you wear the blank scowl so long practiced. Somehow it comforts me, so familiar to me. "How long have you been here with me? Is there anyone else here? I should have noticed..." you break off with a note of anger. 

My thoughts come hard and clear, the night you disappeared and I was captured several hours later, the week of rape and torture before I was brought here. That I only knew it had been a week because someone had said it aloud to me. The few days of madness here alone in the damp, only the faintest glimmer of the rising sun to note the time by. Three times the sun has cast its faint glow since They brought you to me. That you are only here when there is that glow, and then They come to take you, and I'm again alone in the dark. The silence so loud I retreat back into myself to keep from going mad. Where do They take you for so long, what punishment do They visit on you...

"Stop, Hermione, please. Don't think of where that might be, your mind is too open," you grimace darkly. "Why are you here with me? What have They done this for?" you ask not me, but yourself. Now I can feel you thinking, relishing the feel of your thoughts in my burning lonely mind, turning the thought over and over, 'what can They gain from this pairing?'

'To see what has become of the traitor, what They brought my mentor to, he who dared to defy the Dark Lord. To show you what They think of the filth you taught and plotted with, how easily They break the circle Potter holds dear,' my thoughts assault you again, in the Death Eaters own words. I think up the memories I absorbed while They...

You look away during my answers, but now fix that murderous glare on me.

"No, don't show me that image girl, I can't bear it," you growl at me. Of course, you have become my own invention these last days, but you wouldn't really care for the filthy girl before you, my bruised and ruined intelligence.  In my obsession to wake you, hear you, know... so many answers, I forgot again who you are. Distant Professor Snape, not a fixture of my pleasant thoughts of release.

"We will leave this place, I swear it!" Your words bite into my reverie. Clipped and fierce, but words to what, make me hope?

I realize you mean it, and that I believe you! How is this? My tall black haired frightening professor, tormentor, mentor.... protector?

The frantic giggling bubbles up again, threatening to pull me back into the comforting fantasy... 'No child, stay here with me, it hurts I know but trust me, its better here with me.'

And my answer? 'Dear cellmate, my dark and dangerous tree, you don't know how wonderful it is...my Garden.' I begin to share my private haven, pulling you along insistently, carefully walking you into the light slowly, stepping across the grass on my tip-toes... to my shock you are in my mind not free and blissful, but brooding, dressed severely and scowling at me! (_Tsk tsk, what have you done girl, ruined your only escape.) _You pull away, back into the nightmare, using all your powers to make me follow. I'm stunned to find I can resist, more stunned that I am winning this tug-of-soul! The student has found a secret power, **_desperation_**_._ 'Just let me show you where I've been, Professor,' my thoughts are sent slowly, softly, like a whisper. 'Its beautiful, I may be safe here, and They cannot follow.' As we fall into the path, struggling ceases and you relent some, ok, a peek.

You answer my mad escape into peace with dour thoughts, 'show me your madness girl, but then come into reality with me, you must.'

I don't know how long I was gone, (_we were gone, it is WE now!_) but I am somehow more myself now. You are so tired, I finally see what I couldn't dare before...They are winning their battle with you as well. 

You spend the next few hours drifting in and out, not sleeping as I thought but meditating, rebuilding your strength and closing your mind into itself. You share this all with me, openly sending this comfort to me. I feel the madness and desperation leaving me as I float along on these thoughts of yours, and try to imitate your concentrations. It gets harder to see you; I know They come to take you soon. "Be ready," you command. And then you sleep. I drift back into myself. 'I will, I promise I will be ready.' Is this thought in your mind or mine now?

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	4. Giving Up

Giving up 

As the Death Eater retreats from the cell chuckling maniacally, I finally concede. I will not survive this day. I no longer hope to leave this cell alive, and I will not suffer another humiliation of his dark whims. My mind is still intact, my secrets safe for now. But how much longer? I must not let those secrets fall into evil hands.

I bow my head and begin to will my life to drain away before the pain makes concentration impossible. The Cloak of Glass lays heavy on my wounds, a fabric of matted horsehair dipped in powdered dragon scales and other vile things. Every pore of my skin screams for release from its insistent grinding. Finally I am still and it is nearly bearable.

What creature is this moving the pain over me in waves, I turn slowly to look and my horror is complete. It takes a moment to realize you are really there, not an apparition from my mental concentrations. I force my voice to work despite the pain in it from screaming, "You?" I ask in utter confusion, you can't be _here_. Hermione Granger, or rather a crumpled, battered and filthy wraith bearing her likeness. So distant, so haunted you look, my rage is choking me. I know this look. I've worn this look and caused it as well. How many, lost to the Dark in one way or the other. Those I'm charged to protect and I find myself increasing unable to even put off their slide into the abyss. They will pay for bringing you to this! 

I somehow do not understand, how are you here? Why can't you answer me? Trying to gently probe your thoughts I'm assaulted with your mental cry, you also gesture your muteness. Why keep you silent while in your cell and not just for their amusement? 

I find myself gaping at the thin, battered shell They have made of a once vibrant and stubborn young girl I knew, and then quickly compose my face into a blank stare. Ah, you prefer this, maybe you can't recognize me either. I know I can't. I am suddenly so very old and tired.

I implore you to look me in the eyes, your thoughts are so random and so very near madness, I can almost see the thread your frail sanity hangs by. You have visualized it even; a single red strand no thicker than a hair, a small child version of yourself grips it with innocent concentration. There, _concentrate on the eyes_, I remind myself so as to stay in your projected thoughts, slightly more coherent and much less horrifying. Your mind is so painfully clear and strong, utterly defenceless.__

"How long have you been here with me? Is there anyone else here? I should have noticed..." I ask, buried in the puzzle. Why didn't I know it, hear you or see you, or just sense you there? My eyes search the dark corners of our cell; it is larger than I observed before, much larger. Ah, a charm, to hide you until you could actively make yourself known to me. As I look once more into your eyes you begin to drift into your imagination of what happens when the hooded ones take me away and I won't let you go back to the horror of that thought. 'What can They gain from this pairing?' I ponder mostly to myself and am shocked by the speed of your answer. I hear your thoughts in the voices of your tormentors, fragments of their taunting of you, arrogantly telling you _anything_ knowing you will never live to tell tales. Soon you drift into their actions on you as well and I cringe with my own helplessness again. 

"No, don't show me that image girl, I can't bear it," I snap suddenly overwhelmed with anger and renewed spirit to fight, if not to survive than to ensure that you will. I will not lose one more, not now! This is the line I will not cross. 

"We will leave this place, I swear it!" I all but scream to try to find some small corner of hope buried deep within your troubled body. I feel nagging guilt at this flippant statement of false hope, chastising myself for abusing your obvious trust, as you so readily believe me. Then the most curious thought floats between us, your hope becomes my resolve and I know my words were not empty. I need release from the brutal images in your swirling mind and the physical effects of Riddle's interrogators' latest attempt to show me the errors of betrayal. My reluctance to stay connected to your mind while I retreat into myself to meditate is overpowered by the tenuous nature of your psyche, I worry that you will be gone if I abandon our link. 

I'm suddenly aware of your presence, the site of you standing before a path, imploring me to follow. This is not like any mind I have tapped into. You draw me into your madness focused so strongly that it appears as clear as a Pensieve. I pull back to myself trying so hard to bring you with me. Are you too far gone already? OH! Oh no, how strong you are now, I find I can't pull back. Ok, you responded to the authority figure, then the lofty Professor Snape shall offer a deal. A peek only, then reality...

A very disturbing fact is dawning on me. I am no longer in control of this link. You are nearly seductive in appearance and manner, begging me to join you. The flowing white gown you are wearing is clinging to a lithe but fully mature frame, one I recognize! Our last meeting, this is what you wore. I look down, this is what I wore. Muggle clothes, black and highly tailored. When that fails, you begin to regress in your appearance, growing smaller, younger, not quite a woman yet, no longer a girl. Same dress, but it now hangs loosely, only faintly catching the curves that aren't fully defined yet. The schoolgirl I struck this deal with! Suiting your appearance to whatever might make me bend to your will. How have you mastered in so short a time an art I have struggled to perfect for a lifetime? 

'Time to go back,' you question me as a reach out and touch one of the many beautiful flowers. Actually touch it; I can feel the silky petals against my skin. I feel an overwhelming need to run from your paradise lest I soil it with my presence.

Finally I am free of your mind, but I begin to suspect it is only because you let me go.

I concentrate to return my mind to its careful shroud, wind all my waning power around me tightly. 

Soon you are following my methods and I feel the calming in your train of thought. I decide to try some desperate measure of escape at the first opportunity, if only to provoke them to end your suffering and though I don't deserve it, mine as well. 

"Be ready," I admonish you sternly, though for what I cannot begin to imagine. I suddenly feel the need to make the Dark ones believe your concealment remains intact. If I can only sleep until They return and the pain is returned in full, maybe I can keep it hidden within my thoughts for a little longer.


	5. Snake in the Garden

Snake in the garden... 

As They come to take you from me this time, my madness has receded some. I know now that I am hiding me, not them. They now savage you to find me. No more, please, you shouldn't suffer so that I can cower here in the shadows. 

I don't know how, but I clung so fiercely to your mind that we both went with Them. When you faltered, it was so easy to cover you in my embrace. What a strange sensation, to protect another's mind from the Dark ones intrusions. 

I became overwhelmed with the feeling. Not power, something greater. Guardian. I left your secrets un-probed by my new talents, but the Dark ones...so many interesting secrets. I left a seed behind, as I have regained a few of my more important memories just now. 

I know you hear my thoughts, please answer, look up, SEE me. 

'Crazy girl, now I conjure your image freely, without your presence even?' but you are questioning yourself. Hmm, maybe you don't feel me here with you. Ok then, sleep for now. It frustrates the demons so.

Well, maybe still a bit mad. At least the incessant giggling has stopped.

Strange how I look about and see the cell, feel the cold and darkness surrounding me. Yet, I know that where you are is bright, flickering with evil and dark ritual. Don't fret my fussy teacher, I leave Their outward workings and hidden desires where they are. I'm still reeling from my own time spent at their hands. Your mind is like a library, so carefully catalogued but nearly impenetrable. Except to me, trying my level best not to abuse this stroll into your hidden fortress. But I'm sorry my darling, I need something just now. A way to make you understand before I slip back into myself, as pleasant a journey as it will be. 

Spinning now, why? Seeds carefully sown are already bearing fruit. It is your voice, calling through the darkness, shattering the crushing silence, "Answer me now! Don't give up now, They brought me back in the dark. Why? So early?" I feel the commanding tone in my very skin, tingling with what is to come.

'I hear you, be quiet, do not speak aloud again. Please, try to follow, I'm slipping back so soon, too soon...Severus?'

You are following, fumbling in the darkness that isn't really there, on limbs you don't actually have. 'Don't work so hard at it. You want to find me, so there I am.'

'That simple? Did you do that or did I? What charm is this Miss Granger, that you so easily invade my brain and yet yours is chaos itself.' you leave your questions behind, though I am about to give you all the answers you want. See, the path is shorter now. Come with me, lie on the grass and listen to my plants grow.

You are still the severe Potion master, now that I have made you attire yourself I am faced with school robes! Not here in my playground, please. And you wonder why you feel a deviant monster. See, no longer the schoolgirl, now the fully mature woman in the summer dress shopping in Diagon Alley. You thought I didn't see you. If I'm so clever then how did I miss my most imposing teacher following me for over an hour through 4 stores? I know, not lustful, you were concerned. But now I am, as you were seen that day, and had you not wasted time making sure I got my new shoes and haircut unaccosted you might have been gone. And you would not be here. With me. About to fight for your life.

"Ah, so good of you to understand finally Professor. If you believe it is real, then it will be," I nearly purr at you in my glee. You look just amazing lying stretched out beneath the tree I'm perched in. The garden is different now, you look confused a moment.

"I fail to see what there is left to fight about, and please call me Severus if you insist on looking at me like that," and the silky tone of your voice negates the disdain and disapproval written all over your face. 

"But you have changed, is this a young Severus here? Yes, so much younger, near my age then?" I ask with great amusement. He's trying so hard to make this easy for me. To make me more comfortable in his company, not realizing that I already was. My voice (my VOICE, my inner voice is all there is left now I think wryly) changes, trying to convince him of my appreciation of him, just as he is, "Change back, but not the robes, your stalking clothes. You are going to get very angry with me first," I tease from above, just out of reach, for now. "We have plenty of time, as you can see. Would you like to know WHY? Truly?" 

"Who is with us?" and just like that you are on your feet, staring at the company I brought back with me. A snake, long and silver in the sunshine winds his way down my tree toward you. "Is that what I think it is? You did this, got this from MY mind!!" You roughly pull me from the tree to face you. I share all that happened tonight with you, and the idea I planted that They should give up on you, that I have somehow escaped and you had nothing to do with it. 

"I found him guarding a passage deep within you, somewhere important. The only secret you kept from me, once you were aware it was me," and I show you that I didn't pass your sentinel, merely coaxed him here with me. "I need you to understand what I can do, tell me why I can. I haven't a wand, or anything else. And my mind was nearly destroyed, yet here I am, and though I know this is my version of the abyss, why does it strengthen me? Tell me, you must know somehow," the desperation in my voice scares even me. I never noticed how tall you are, ever so much taller than me, and just now it makes me feel so much better, safer somehow. In this brief moment I pause to show you everything, let you peek into the swirling mess of my conscious thoughts as well. How I removed my voice and left it at Hogwart's so as to say goodbye to my parents and leave the letter with George. The hands in the dark when I was so nearly done, the school just a few more moments from me. I allow you access to the dark place I keep the next week of my life. Go, look, but you go alone, its all right. When you return I'll ask my final questions. 

I wait forever on the edge of the path, you just ahead trying to steel yourself for that walk. Finally you turn back to me.

"No, I won't look there, Hermione. I saw enough before. They took your final innocence didn't They? The ability to walk alone unafraid. To trust a man's touch. Your first time... I saw enough. Your mind is too vivid for me, I always said you had too much imagination, Miss Granger," the critical note in your voice is strangely comforting now. Finally, you take me in your arms, "They will never hurt you again, you know that now, don't you? I will not let them." Forgive a tired old man, you implore me, unaware that I can hear you. Your body in the cell rasps loudly at this and I fear what I may be doing to your mind, is it permanent? I'm calmly resolved to see this through, possibly our last day on earth. I know that time here passes slowly, it will feel like so much longer, but never enough. Like a shining dream, I try to capture all this for you. That's why I don't recognize this garden, and why you are so confused....

"This is an estate, somewhere my mother took me once as a child. It was just before I got my letter for school, 10 years old then. An aunt's house, if you go around these trees here, the water you hear is running into a duckpond," you tell me gently, I have never heard this tenderness in your voice before. You are still holding me, cradling my head in your hands. "I don't know how you did this, why you can. I've never heard of such strong telepathic links, nor such sanctuaries before. But then, I've not been raped..." I cut off your self-loathing with my fingers on your lips. So soft, but strangely set. Determined not to give in, but wanting so badly to make me feel... what, better, whole, SANE?

"Silly man, this will do it. Maybe both of us. I don't understand, but what do we have to lose? They come to kill you tomorrow, and I can hide myself from them, but I am dying already, you know that don't you? See the weakness settled into me, starved and fading. Give me this, willingly, because you want to. Trust that tomorrow, hope will find us well. There is a fraction of hope," now you stop my mouth with a gentle kiss. 


	6. Giving in and Redemption

Giving in and redemption 

I awake hanging once more in the cell, the rough cloth again searing into me. I try to see you but can't seem to open my eyes. Then I begin to understand, they are open! Little wonder your decent was so rapid, a few moments of this has me nearly panicked. I try my voice in the bitter and vicious silence, "Hermione, are you there? It's still dark, They brought me back early. What can it mean? I have something to show you, a plan maybe." As I struggle to remember the past few hours, I find visions of you with me, your image burned into to my brain now. I took strength from that somehow, and keeping my mind from Them was so much easier than it has been. Maybe protecting you was all incentive I needed. Did I alert them to your appearance to me, both in my thoughts and here, in my cell? No, I'm sure not, but then why are you so still that I hear no chains and no breath while you sleep? I nearly scream for your attention, afraid that you aren't sleeping, unwilling to think what else could still you so, "Answer me now! Don't give up now; They brought me back in the dark. Why? So early?" Authority hiding the fear in my voice.

When you answer your thoughts are calmer, you seem again the whole and purposeful young woman I knew such a short time ago, hundreds of years before this dungeon. I struggle to follow you in the darkness that surrounds us on the path to your sanctuary; the pain in my body follows even to this journey.

As you stop my invasion of your inner self, suddenly the light fills my brain and I am whole again. I understand that you have forced me to find my own appearance for you here. The question flies off to you before I can stop it, 'that simple? Did you do that or did I? What charm is this Miss Granger, that you so easily invade my brain and yet yours is chaos itself.' I don't want the answer suddenly, afraid that I am not saving you, that you are infecting me. Dragging me into madness with guile and seduction where They failed with pain and terror. I drape my image of myself as I am most guarded, in full Professor's robes and my usual carefully arranged appearance. I feel suddenly like a predator, preying on the innocent child you were in my classes, the child you no longer are. 

You admonish me gently, sweetly, but with seduction and easy, casual sensuality dripping from even the cotton dress you wore that summer day. I try to recreate that day's attire for myself, the disguise of a businessman, one of so many that day in London before I followed you into the wizarding world as unseen guardian. Of course, you did see me lurking in the shadows. Ashamed I try to make myself more what you might invite into this garden, one I realize I must know. Familiar somehow...

I give in finally, beginning to understand your intentions, hoping the languid young woman in the tree remains, and the pale, thin, fragile desperation you are does not return. 

"I fail to see what there is left to fight about, and please call me Severus if you insist on looking at me like that," but you are not happy with my younger self, why would you want this dark and ancient monster instead? The sarcastic teacher who must surely have made your circle of friends resentful and angry. I content myself to relish the possibilities of this new arrangement, and fight the urge to remove the monster from your mind, me. There is something new in your personality, something refreshing and tempting, but I feel it is also dangerous. I get the answer like a rush of cold water through my heart, you are not longer afraid of death, you are sure of it! Resignation mixed with certainty has turned you confident, insistent, and I find completely irresistible. 

But we have company, and as I recognize my own image of the snake, my loyal guardian to my deepest secrets I pull you from your tree with anger and fear. You hit me with the memories of your journey through my mind with a quiet force that nearly sends me reeling back down the path into... darkness. As I struggle to remain not only upright, but here with you I finally know: I am truly mad. In that final resignation I am released, much as you now seem. Free in a way I have never felt. 

You want the same answers I do, how is this happening, the woman child with a power greater than any I have ever stood up against. And then you push toward my final fear, your wish to share the memories of your torment, one I can never erase for you, could not save you from. The torment that brought you here, to this darkness, to me. I try to will myself to see, you seem to need me to see this. I find I cannot, no matter how hard I try. I have to admit my failure to you, and I'd give anything not to, to let you believe I fear no thing and no task.

I cover my failure in a mask of criticism, of you as well as of myself, and draw you to me protectively. I'm overwhelmed with the need for forgiveness. Something I've never dared ask of anyone else, not even myself, I need of you. My body, my real body alone in the darkness in chains and pain, cries out with the final defiance of this need. And then I know, that's why THIS garden, my garden this time and not your own, because you have already forgiven. You know all I am, saw it through my own consciousness, and found nothing there to condemn me for. I tell you about this place, the last place I remember being truly unburdened. Try to explain my utter lack of answers for you gently, "I don't know how you did this, why you can. I've never heard of such strong telepathic links, nor such sanctuaries before. But then, I've not been raped..." You draw my final regrets of failure from me with an achingly soft finger to my lips. I want, no I NEED to give you... whatever it is you are asking for. Hoping that this will finally set you free, make you back into that confident and charming young woman gaily trying on shoes and picking through a bookstore a lifetime ago. 

Your answer is shocking, real and unafraid. The wanting of your spirit has bathed this 'body' before me. "Silly man, this will do it. Maybe both of us. I don't understand, but what do we have to lose? They come to kill you tomorrow, and I can hide myself from them, but I am dying already, you know that don't you? See the weakness settled into me, starved and fading. Give me this, willingly, because you want to. Trust that tomorrow, hope will find us well. There is a fraction of hope," I cover your mouth with mine before I can find a chance to talk myself out of it. Drive the thoughts of reality from our hideaway with one hungry kiss. All the world melts away, every nagging question of the dungeon is driven out in a rush of carnal need. I find it is _your _need I feel and its intoxicating me, pulling every fibre of my fractured mind together into this wanton, shaking, desperately needy frame of the sternly clad professor. Your hands run down my chest and the costume melts away. My last secret takes over, and the body you feel is not my own entirely. Where your hot little hands (hands, what hands, if not real as they feel, then what is _this_) roam my body I am smooth, clean and completely unblemished. Tiny moans gather in your throat and leak into my mouth. Passion racks my body, never felt this hot, this needy, this terrible greed...

You feel so pure beneath my touch, loath to hurt you or force anything so my hands twist into your hair in an attempt to push this lust away from you. But you won't let me, pulling me to you and we are falling, so slowly, defying gravity in your will to lie in the cool grass with my weight crushing the nightmare out of you entirely. I hear your chant, one thought rolling over and over, 'undo Their lesson, show me what it can be.' And I'm powerless to stop you, your will becomes my want. The desperate need to wrap myself in you completely. I'm plagued with a tiny driving question, just beyond my reach. If I reach for it, you tug me to you, smothering me in desire. Skin, the whole world is your silky warm skin, perfect and sweet and so very female. The moments spin into years, balanced here on the edge of intrusion. I force your face to mine, eyes burning with lust, and filling my soul with quaking fear. I am lost. Gone forever into your eyes, you slowly grind yourself onto me, burying me within you in a final act of supplication and domination. The ground drops away as I'm finally completely terrifyingly whole, not only my manhood but my soul covered to the very edges of myself with your fragile but enormous spirit. Seduction, no, this is so much more. We rock to each other's rhythms, the climax building together like an inevitable storm. My hands feverishly searching your small frame for a grasp to keep me from losing my mind entirely, finding only your neck vibrating with the force of your moans, your back arched in to complete me, your hips swaying and shaking with the power of our lovemaking. Spinning in the void, you are above me, covering my chest in kisses filled with growls of passion. The screams of release are ripping from my throat and you gather them in with your mouth, licking the corners of my mouth with trembling kisses and I'm flying away into the void after this powerful climax. 

"Severus, come back to me. So much to tell you about this, please," you whisper to me. A secret, an important little thought returns. "I know, we have no bodies here so what have we joined together? I think you know, spirit soul and mind, and something precious and powerful has taken over me. I have a way out, I only hope I haven't driven you mad with this... gift. For you Severus, I'll gladly leave this garden forever, if you lead me home."

I turn the thoughts back into myself. Home, of course. One I can save, my saviour, my redeemer. For you, anything for you my love, to make you safe, Hermione. Into the darkness, into the void, into the mouth of hell itself to carry you to safety. An idea, ancient and untried magic, all the protection I can think of creeps slowly into my brain. Dangerous, desperate, but so necessary. Must try, but sleep, dreamless and painless is calling, and I can't resist that either. So very lost...


	7. I'll Stand Guard

I'll stand guard 

Quietly waiting until you no longer shake in your sleep, I slowly prod you with a single thought, over and over I scream it from my soul now, 'The Light comes soon, Severus! Soon, soon, soon...'

"When, how do you know this, child?" Your thoughts scramble for order in the chaos of our minds, the snatch of conversation I remember. Harry assuring me that in two weeks, he will bring the war to Riddle in the last assault. The ultimate surprise, even you wouldn't expect it. "Because Dumbledore would never do this, attack openly, offensively," you answer my fevered thoughts.

'But he isn't, he isn't calling strategy anymore. This is Ron's doing, the brilliant strategist has the perfect plan. And the Order will succeed in ending this for good, in that they can't possibly fail.' I know fully what this means and I need you to understand my acceptance, we will perish or we will win, but we will be free either way. 'They come today, before the nightfall and this is the last of our time here.'

"And you wait to tell me this deliberately? So that I couldn't tell them, ah, clever girl. It isn't just the madness, you hid this from me. I also have a surprise for you," the glint in your eye is amazing and brilliant. "Will They come back for you, before the darkness?" you question me aloud and in my drifting thoughts. When you find that They won't, you slowly undo my restraints. I am unaware of the freedom for a moment. I blink hard to try to understand.  

"Come return the favour," you demand, the gleam of conspirator in your eye and the tip of the wand peaking from the blanket now. AHA! 

'My hero!' I proclaim with every ounce of my essence. Slowly and so very tentatively I try my tired and battered limbs. You wince with the pain I refuse to show in my face as I creep across to you, unable to stand. Taking the wand and repeating the spells you give my confused mind, I release you as well. You slowly bring me to my feet, supporting my weight. The pain of the blanket is great, I have seen this in your thoughts, yet you pull it around you as you lead us to my filthy corner. 

"Can you not guess why? It is all I have, dear," the sarcastic reply comes. The overwhelming humiliation of it dawns on me, mixed in with the feelings I am getting from you, your meticulous dressing habits, your modesty, and something else... something you hid from me here in our link. I carefully remove the tattered and thin cloak They have covered me in and hand it to you, turning my back to you. It isn't my lack of shame at being completely naked that causes your gasp, but the selflessness of my gesture and the wounds upon my back. The burns, the bruises, partially healed cuts and gouges, and the darkness of something more sinister healed magically. I feel your hot tears on my back as you gently replace the cloak. Your hands are rough and gentle and insistent as you turn me around. Slowly you remove the blanket, not daring to look into my eyes. It is not the body from our garden. This is the secret you hide so carefully. You force yourself to stand your full height for me, clad only in an odd looking loincloth (no, its a dirty and bloodied bandage!). The marks you bear are everywhere, some new, some beginning to heal, and some are shining scars of long ago. Your time here now, the last war, your childhood, the past is written all over your body in horrifying detail. In respect and profound caring I dare not look away. I reach out tentatively and trace the knotted marks of the whip that are older than I am across your strong shoulders. My touch doesn't create a response at all, you are a statue of flesh and pain. And I see, you haven't had these old wounds erased with magic for a powerful reason. As if seeing you for the first time I begin to slowly work my way around you, touching this scar or that, holding my fingers above fresh wounds. As I come back around to your face, I'm amazed to see your eyes watching me intently. Your look is unreadable, but you are thinking, 'why aren't you repulsed by me?' 

'Every trace of damage to your flesh, you wear them to remind you, to steel your resolve. I'm honoured that you'd show me. Severus, you are beautiful. You are beautiful to me.'  My brilliant light of hope when the madness was taking me away, knowing I would not die alone here on the wet stone. All the pain and humiliation wiped away in one look at your battered spirit hanging across from me. Finding a way to end my silence. The renewal of my hope by the mating of our souls, I let this flood over you. My private garden shining for you to see, inviting you to join me here in the most guarded corner of my mind, the place where I hid my soul from the hooded demons. Willingly you come to this place we share, I pause here for a moment that hangs infinitely between us. 

"Come back now, come into reality once more please. You must, just once more I promise. Stay with me today, one last day and then you will be free," you begin gently, imploring me out of the haven of my subconscious mind. Your tone turns cold and clipped, the Professor Snape I remember from so long ago surfacing in your desperation to keep me sane a few hours longer, "Miss Granger look at me now! I demand it!"

My eyes refocus on you just in time to watch the spark of panic on your face for a heartbeat. Thankfully you replace it with the unreadable mask of stone I'm accustomed to seeing. 'Promise again, this is the last time. It will end soon, over finally. Show me...' 

We live the next few moments as a lifetime, it must have been only a few heartbeats, but seemed forever. Slowly, almost imperceptibly you draw me closer, and begin to lay me down all at once. You sense that I cannot bear the stone on my flesh again and so lay me on top of you carefully, unwilling to acknowledge the pain this must cause you. By the time you have settled us prone against the floor I can't tell where your breath ends and mine begins. My mouth drops open as the silent protest of pain bursts out of me and the spell is broken, time rushes back to normal. The feel of my mouth barely brushing yours for an instant drives the thoughts of pain from me, and you begin to wrap me in your arms. I realize I still hold the stolen wand, mentally noting to find out how you did that! The feeling of warm human touch, real this time, begins to wash through me, already healing the scars upon my mind. I faintly feel you take the wand from me and begin to mutter something I can't quite understand. My whole flesh is pressed to you, my hands on your chest and my body feels like it is floating with the relief of comfort, finally comfort. I am nearly warm again; your body heat begins to work its charms on me. I gaze into your eyes and am losing myself in them. Did you know how deep your soul is? I can fall forever.

"Yes, touch is magical isn't it? Concentrate on that, the feeling of protection. Nothing will harm you while my arms encircle you. Cling to that with all your mind. Do you hear that? They are here; I can hear the battle, Hermione. The Light has found you. You are safe," your voice is hypnotic, and I believe you are using our link on me as well. Safe, nothing can harm me; our hearts beat as one, the rush of your blood in my ears as I lay my face down against your neck. I don't know where I end and you begin. One soul locked in two bodies, one heartbeat, one spirit, even our magic is joining. I feel you drawing my power, willing me to sleep now. Sleep, can I sleep? I could sleep forever.

"Shh, sleep then. I'll stand guard." Your silky voice uttering these words of comfort echo through my being...


	8. Safety

Safety 

The war raged so fiercely and with such a terrible shift toward the Dark that the end was so surprisingly abrupt. But that is a tale for another to tell. 

My brother Bill and I were occupied with seeking out escaping Death Eaters when the end came. But the discovery I made was something I could never prepare for. There in the final cell in the dungeon of the Malfoy Manor were both our missing Order members, laying wrapped in a filthy black shroud and deathly pale and still. They seemed to be lit, glowing or something. Bill approached them so carefully you'd think they were Lucius Malfoy in full temper. And somehow he was right, as he was nearly touching Hermione's shoulder he was knocked across the room and nearly killed by the landing. A blinding red flash accompanied his flight. 

Snape stirred at this and I _felt_ the quiet muttering more than heard it. It was in my head, not out loud. Complicated, ancient incantations of protection and binding. The result, if anyone tried to touch her they would fail quite painfully. And worse, if someone tried to separate them they'd both perish, quickly and painlessly but quite dead. Impressed, and awed a bit at his obvious heroics considering the state he was in physically, I yelled for an Auror, and kept yelling. 

Then he spoke; monotone, deadly and absolutely deafening his warning came, "ENCIRCLING SAFETY YOU CANNOT BREACH, HER GENTLE SOUL YOU WILL NOT REACH. IF YOU SHOULD TRY TO END MY SPELL, I SHALL GIVE MY LIFE TO KEEP HERS WELL. MY ARMS WILL NOT TIRE AND YOU WILL BREAK MY GRIP NEVER, AND SHOULD YOU TRY I WILL END US FOREVER."

"Severus, its ok now. She's safe, the Death Eaters are gone, and Riddle is no more," Dumbledore whispered from behind me. The result was immediate and stunning. Snape's glowing features smoothed suddenly, pain and worry creased his brow as he asked quietly, "Does she yet breathe? I cannot feel her heartbeat anymore." The pain overcame him and he lowered the wand into Dumbledore's waiting hand. 

"George, hurry, take this and get help. They'll need some blankets," he bade me run, and I did. When I returned several minutes later, the couple had been separated, each wrapped in an Auror's cloak and suspended by Dumbledore and my now conscious brother. Hermione was asking for her face to be covered against the cold and the blinding light, so Bill complied with a slow hand. She quickly lapsed back into slow, even breathing in her sleep.

Snape didn't look as good. His face was paler than usual, very ugly lines of red running from his temples. He was barely breathing. Just before Bill left the room, he awoke and saw her. Snape began to scream and curse. "NOO, just a few minutes more, I could've given her a little more strength. She can't be gone, she was so strong. No, no no no," he sobbed raggedly and fell silent just as I realized what he thought with dawning horror and tried to reassure him.

"She is ALIVE Professor, you protected her, she's safe now," but my words fell on deaf ears, he was unconscious. I followed Dumbledore as he moved his suspended patient into the hall where they could be safely transported to more skilled healers. I went with the two of them, carrying the wand he had used, as I had heard the spells he used and his words of warning. Madame Pomfrey listened to all I said as she gave Hermione a drink from a small vial and then separated them to smaller rooms in the makeshift hospital we were in. 

"Ah, the brave lad. He may not live to hear her gratitude I fear, he has given nearly all he had to protect her. George dear, please go and calm Hermione and assure her I will do all I can for him. Hurry now, I'll come soon," she pushed me away from his still and oddly serene body.

"Severus, Professor, oh, George, please is he well? Did They come back for him, tell me something quick," Hermione implored me. Her face haunts me to this day, she was flushed and glowing and very beaten. I'd never seen anyone so thin and frail looking, and her eyes were hot and fierce, almost primal in her frantic pleading. The clean white robe she now wore only set off the cuts and bruises that covered every visible inch of her, and her small hands were burned. Her normally wild hair stood completely on end, radiating an odd light that was so familiar. The red flash! It was all over her face and hair, charging her with an eerie glow that was breathtaking.

"Lay still now, he's in good hands. You can see him soon, he needs rest and care you can't give him right now," I explained, laying her back down gently, aware that every touch of her was burning my skin. The spell had ended nearly an hour ago, and yet every part of her body burned fiercely with the protection charm like a raging fire. Dumbledore entered quietly and proclaimed she looked as well as anyone could have hoped, and that she'd be just fine. 

"Sleep now dear, I'll be back soon," he said as he turned to me and motioned for the door. We returned to Snape's bedside to see Bill, Ron and Madame Pomfrey standing over the ever-paler form of the potion master in bitter concentration. Dumbledore explained the spell to us, as best he understood it. "Protection charms are rarely as strong as that one. He created a harbour for them, I've never heard of such a thing but he appears to have joined their magic to accomplish it. The results are still manifesting. I think he will recover though," he said, turning to the man on the bed and waving his wand over him. A few moments later, Snape began to stir. 

"Hermione, I'm so sorry," he groaned weakly. He turned his head to the door just as she came through it and shushed him. Her aura still glowed pink, and her movements were slow and smooth. As she reached his side I saw that her skin was now Snape's own shade of pale white, her hair was perfectly smooth, raven and shining, her eyes a glittering black, and not a mark could be seen on her anywhere.

"Shh, sleep now Severus, I'll stand guard," she whispered to him. We all backed up to allow her presence, a bit awed to look at her. She began to speak softly of a garden, but soon only Snape could hear her words. 

"No more pain, They will never hurt you again," he droned, his voice resigned and very quiet. "Goodbye, Hermione. I'm sorry I couldn't save you, but at least you are now at peace." His words began to sink in to the small crowd gathered at his bedside. He believed she had died, and no amount of convincing on our part was enough. 


	9. My Garden

My garden 

"I will not leave your side until you believe me my love. We are alive, and I have you to thank, so please wake up and understand that today."

It's my new chant, ever present thought first and always. Sitting at your bedside these past weeks, watching you get stronger every day. Somehow you did what no one would have believed, gave me your life. Dumbledore says you were very near death for that gift, but you kept us both safe in those final hours.

You used our link for your spell, my sweet hero, and that has bound us for eternity you know. That cannot be undone. I no longer know the madness you found me in. I fear that you do. When you gave me so much, did you take that in return? I will not give up... I cannot, will not, live without you. And you know how stubborn I can be when there is a problem to solve. 

"Wake up now, come out here, foolish man and speak to me. I'm not leaving until you do," I say again, and again, and again.

You are mine as I am yours, and nothing can ever part us, not time or pain or magic can ever separate us again, my love.  I'm sure you will walk from this hospital and join me today, as sure as I was yesterday, and as sure as I will be tomorrow. 

'Of course my angel, but please, enough of this. Take me into the Garden, I'm so very tired now. Lay me in the grass, share your soul once more. Hermione, my own. Safe, finally...'

Author's note: Thank you for reading, reviews always appreciated.


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